The present invention relates to a video display apparatus and a backlight unit to be applied therein, and it relates to, in particular, a backlight unit, being advantageous in thin-sizing and high picture quality, and also suitable for achieving an areal dimming (or a local dimming), and further a video display apparatus applying the same therein.
In recent years, as a backlight for a liquid crystal display apparatus is applied that of a side-light method, as is mentioned in the following Patent Document 1, for example. However, since the light source is disposed concentrating to an end of the screen, it is difficult to achieve heat radiation thereof, and therefore has a drawback of bringing about difficulty of achieving the local dimming and a large-sizing thereof. As a method for dissolving this is already known a so-called just under-method, which builds up a backlight by spreading or covering a rear surface of a liquid crystal panel with a large number of light sources, as is mentioned in the following Patent Document 2, for example.
However, in the case of the just-under method, in particular, since it is necessary to increase a number of the light sources for achieving the thin-sizing, this brings about an increase of costs and electric power consumption therein. Also, when trying to reduce the number of the light sources within the just-under method, it is necessary to increase thickness (e.g., a distance from the light sources to the liquid crystal panel) for reducing unevenness of brightness, and this is disadvantageous for achieving the thin-sizing of the video display apparatus.